The Thief of All Light

by Bernard Schaffer

  “I was looking at the pictures of these fine young things, and that one with the long black hair, with the freckles?”

  “Judy,” Freddie whispered.

  “Yeah, Judy.” He leaned sideways, picked up a picture that was lying on the floor, and held it up, showing the camera a little girl in a middle school class photo. Her butterfly headband was low on her forehead and she smiled at the camera, showing off her braces. “She has that look in her eye. I need to know, man. Tell me.”

  “Tell you what?” Freddie asked.

  The man held up Judy’s photograph to his face and inhaled, grinning as he put the picture back down. “Tell me about her.”

  Freddie stared at him, the knees of both legs bouncing up and down at the heel so furiously that the table was shaking.

  “Come on, man, I need to know,” the man said. “Was it good? It had to be good. My God, just look at her.”

  “It . . . it was her first time.”

  “How’d you do? You give it to her nice and hard? Make her squeal a little or a lot?”

  “I had trouble holding back. It was over pretty fast.”

  The man looked down at the picture again, “Well, who could blame you? What about the other two? Which one was better or worse?”

  “Judy,” he said, leaning toward the older girl’s photograph. “I couldn’t get the younger one to myself long enough to make it work.”

  “Well, they can’t all be home runs. You spend any time with her? Get any oral at least?”

  “A little.”

  “How was that?”

  “Not that great,” Freddie said. “She has an overbite. Bit me pretty good down there one time.”

  “Well,” the man said, grinning, “I sure am glad we talked. I feel better. How about you?”

  “It’s not that often you get to talk to someone who understands. Especially a cop.”

  The man slid the little girl’s photograph back off the table. “Tell me about it.”

  “So can I go now?” Freddie said.

  “Hang on one second, let me get Bill.” The man got up from the table and opened the door, calling out, “Bill, can you come in here?”

  Bill walked in holding a pair of handcuffs behind his back. “Do I even need to ask?”

  The man put his hand on Freddie’s shoulder, then pointed to the camera and said, “He gave up all three. You might want to turn that off before Harv comes in. But don’t let him listen to the tape yet or we’ll be cleaning blood off the ceiling for days.”

  The screen went black, and the chief stopped the tape again. He looked over at Carrie and saw her sitting motionless, eyes wide and fixed on the screen. “Pretty awful, yeah?” Waylon said.

  Carrie could not respond.

  “So here’s what you don’t know,” Waylon said. “We had no physical evidence in any of those cases. Just the little girls’ initial statements, and they were starting to crack from the mental pressure of having to testify. The youngest one, Mary? She started throwing up every time anyone even mentioned the investigation. On the night we did this interview, she was rushed to the emergency room for dehydration.” Waylon leaned back in his seat. “If we hadn’t gotten a confession, the DA was refusing to prosecute just to spare the children the trauma of having to face their accuser. This interview was do-or-die. As awful as it is to watch, as awful as it is to even contemplate, what you just saw is an act of heroism.”

  “It’s heroism talking about how much you enjoy having sex with children?” Carrie scowled.

  “No.” Waylon shook his head. He scratched his scalp, trying to find the right words. “You know how in war, there’s the guys you see on TV, wearing their nice, clean uniforms? Those are the guys we watch on the news and let lead the parades. That’s the way we want to imagine our soldiers.”

  “Okay,” she said.

  “Well, there are also guys you don’t hear about. The ones behind enemy lines, crawling through sewage lines just to sneak up on some poor bastard and kill him while he’s sitting on the toilet. There’s people doing necessary things that we don’t want to know anything about. Things that violate all the ideas we have about what’s proper, yet that’s what it takes to win. If you really want to be a detective, you need to understand that.”

  She looked at the TV screen, not speaking.

  “See, to get a confession sometimes means putting the well-being of the victims over your own mental health. Jacob used to always say that it felt like he was unlocking areas of his mind that weren’t meant to be unlocked. Going places that you never come all the way back from. A kind of darkness, was how he put it. Looking back, maybe he was right. I guess the darkness won. It’s like that quote about the abyss.”

  “What quote?”

  “When you look into the abyss, it looks back into you.” Bill ejected the tape from the machine and slid it back into the envelope, saying, “I’ve known a lot of cops over the years, kiddo. A lot of investigators. Everyone from federal agents to big-city homicide detectives, and Jacob Rein was the best. Anybody who says different better not say it around me. I get that he did a terrible thing, and he paid a heavy price for that. But more than a few little kids got safe because of what that man was willing to do when it was his time to do it.”

  Carrie watched him get up from his seat and head down the hall toward his office. She looked at the black TV screen, seeing her own reflection staring back at her in the dark glass.

  4

  THAT DAY THE CALLS TRICKLED IN. IT WAS THE KIND OF SHIFT THAT dragged on. Sometimes Carrie got so bored she scanned the state police channels, listening to their dispatcher fire off jobs nonstop. Domestics, car crashes, retail thefts, one after the other in rapid succession. She dreamed of that kind of police work, going job to job with barely enough time to write the paper on each one. The days would fly by then. Instead, her slow twelve-hour shift felt like a prison sentence. Hard, monotonous labor for twelve hours, paroled for twelve, and then right back the next day to do it all over again.

  She ran a speed trap on the 423 Highway, keeping her car parked close enough to the road to let drivers see her and slow down in time. Most did. Only the real idiots flew past, somehow missing the marked police unit with full decals and lightbar and the uniformed officer behind its wheel holding an Accutrak. At each car stop, she walked up to the car and asked for their license and registration, and the rest was up to them.

  Cops, cops’ family members, military veterans, prosecuting attorneys, and nurses didn’t get tickets. Nobody she knew on a first-name basis got a ticket, which tended to be a lot of people in such a small area. They all received written warnings the first time just to let them know it wasn’t a game and there was an official record.

  Old people, and anyone who looked as if they were struggling, they just got a verbal warning. A “slow down and drive safe, you speed demon, these young folks can’t keep up with you,” or something cute like that.

  Everybody else got a citation. But it was up to them, what kind and how many. She had a mental scale of how much attitude she would tolerate from someone before issuing another citation, kind of like a mental thermostat. Most people had some sort of attitude when they got pulled over, that was just normal. But they cooled out as she went through her spiel, and by the time she was done, they thanked her for keeping the roads safe.

  Assholes who ran their mouths were talking themselves into more citations with every word that fell out of their faces. Fines and points on their licenses racked up with every curse and every ignorant comment about her gender, her police department, and cops in general, ringing out in her mind like winning amounts on a slot machine.

  She heard the next car’s engine coming her way before she could see it. It was moving so fast that it hit the first white line of her speed trap before she could press the Accutrak’s button. It was a black blur across the highway, doing at least 100. Carrie’s heart pounded against her ribs as she peeled out after it, throwing gravel and dirt in every direction, kicking
on the overheads and wailer. “Thirty-Four-Four, I’m attempting to stop a vehicle, high rate of speed,” she called out on the radio, shouting over the siren.

  The car pulled ahead of her—a black Nissan, tinted windows, after-market exhaust—and she jammed the gas pedal down.

  Drug dealer, she thought. Active warrants. Maybe an escaped prisoner. A wanted homicide suspect.

  These possibilities raced across her mind like quicksilver, flooding her arms and legs with adrenaline. The dispatcher asked for her location, and it was all Carrie could do to spit out, “North on 423, black Nissan,” in between multiple short, sharp breaths.

  The chief’s voice crackled over the radio, “Thirty-Four-C to Thirty-Four-Four, are you in pursuit?”

  “Negative, sir,” Carrie panted. “Just trying to catch up.”

  Pursuits were nearly forbidden except in the most extreme situations, and Carrie knew it. Police departments around the country had been sued enough times for chasing people and causing multiple innocent victims to be crushed, run over, and blown up that their insurance companies had stricken them from the rulebooks.

  Telephone poles whipped past in a blur. Oncoming cars slowed and pulled over at the sight of her Crown Vic screaming up the highway. They were heading into a long stretch of road through Hansen Woods, with nothing but trees and fishing streams on either side.

  She tightened her grip on the steering wheel, feeling it vibrate under the strain and speed. Other cops were calling over the radio, saying they were en route to back her up, their voices charged with excitement at something, anything, finally happening. She knew this was dangerous. Cops in pursuit tended to be overloaded with adrenaline when it ended, and invariably wound up kicking the living shit out of the suspect. It was the kind of thing that made national headlines and lived forever on the Internet.

  She could see the Nissan ahead of her, now close enough to make out the tag, and she grabbed the microphone, calling out, “PA, Echo-Delta-Gulf . . .” but her voice faded as the car’s brake lights flashed once, twice, and the car suddenly pulled over. “I-It’s stopping,” she said, feeling a strange sense of calm flooding through her, washing up through her hands and into her arms, sliding down her chest and pooling deep in the pit of her stomach.

  The road was narrow here, without any shoulder. Just two lanes, and nothing but trees as far as she could see. No houses. No people. The sun streamed through the clustered foliage all around them, giving everything a soft, golden light.

  She picked up the radio and said, “We’re stopped,” then reached down and unsnapped her holster, putting her hand on her gun’s grip.

  Water trickled out of the Nissan’s fat exhaust pipe, and she could hear its engine rumbling. The rear windshield was opaque in the shadows of the woods. She drew her pistol and kept it low as she slid out of the police car, shutting the door quietly so it didn’t give her away.

  “Driver!” she shouted. “Put both of your hands through the window and keep them there.”

  A pair of hands came out through the window.

  She circled to the left, trying to get a look inside the car. The windows were too dark to see through. Any hidden occupants had a perfect shot at her. She doubled back to her vehicle, keeping the gun in both hands as she went around the passenger side, coming up to the rear right bumper. She slapped the fender and said, “Roll down the passenger window.”

  It came down and she moved sideways, eyes zeroed in on the car door, waiting for it to pop open. Movement inside the rear compartment made her twitch and touch the pistol’s trigger, feeling the smooth curve with the tip of her finger. She could see something in the side mirror’s glass and said, “Passenger, put your hands out the window! Do it now!”

  The car rocked, followed by the unclicking of a seat belt, and then a pair of tiny, sticky hands slid through the open window. A little girl poked her head out, her long, curly hair draped over the door. “Hello, police. I have to go potty.”

  The sound that came out of Carrie was something like a punctured football as she lowered her gun. “Officer?” the man called from the driver’s seat. “Can we make this fast? I’m trying to get my little girl home before she has an accident.”

  Carrie holstered her gun and walked up to the passenger window, feeling sweat pouring down her sides, soaking through her bra and bulletproof vest. She smiled at the little girl and said, “Go ahead and get back in your seat, honey.”

  “Okay,” the little girl said.

  The dad ducked down to see Carrie and said, “I guess I was speeding?”

  “Yeah, just a little,” she said.

  “Sorry about that, she was screaming. We’re just starting potty training.”

  “Go.”

  “And then my wife called.”

  “Go, I said!” Carrie wiped her forehead and felt her hand come away wet. She smacked the roof of the car with her hand. “Get going before I change my mind, and slow down.”

  He looked at her in confusion, as if he was about to continue arguing, but then he thought better of it, rolled up his window, and stepped on the gas. Carrie watched the Nissan take off down the highway, just as the sound of sirens appeared over the distance. Four police cars, coming her way, fast. The dispatcher had been calling to check her status since she’d gotten out of the car, and Carrie had forgotten to turn on her portable radio.

  * * *

  In the old days, people had to come to the police station to report crimes. There was a two-way telephone mounted to the wall outside the station for when someone needed help after hours and the clerk had already gone home. The telephone went directly to the county’s only dispatcher, and it was hit or miss if they were awake, or sober enough, to answer it.

  In those days, people did for themselves, Carrie figured as she headed back toward town. Now, they can’t drive past a cat crossing the street without calling 911. Back then, there was no guarantee the police were coming anytime soon, so folks tended to sort things out themselves. Probably much more efficiently, too, she thought.

  In the very old days, before police had radios in their cars, there was a tall pole near the station’s entrance, with a blue lightbulb at the very top. When someone needed help, they flicked on the light and had to wait for the cop working in that area to drive by and see it.

  They probably had a better chance of seeing Jesus walking up the street than seeing a cop when one was needed, she thought. Criminals knew it too. If you broke into somebody’s house, you weren’t getting chased off by the sound of a burglar alarm, you were getting a chest full of buckshot. Done and done. Efficient. Old school.

  As she passed the station, she saw someone standing by the station door and flicked on her blinker to turn into the parking lot. She looked at her radio, making sure it was on. Dispatch had not called. She stopped her car at the edge of the driveway and looked at her phone. No missed phone calls. She lowered her sunglasses to get a better look. A woman, early fifties, holding a large purse. Large enough to have a gun, Carrie thought. In her first year on the job, a state trooper at Blooming Grove barracks had been ambushed by a maniac with a sniper rifle.

  Carrie unsnapped her holster, getting her weapon ready to draw, if needed. Some of the best advice she’d ever heard about policing was, “Treat everybody like a million bucks, and have a plan to kill them.”

  Carrie looked the woman over, thinking, If she comes out with a gun when I park my car, I’m going to bail out the driver’s side door, get low for cover, duck around the rear fender, and come up shooting.

  She pulled in, watching the woman just stand there, holding her purse. Carrie got out of her car and shut the door, keeping the car between her and the woman. “Can I help you?”

  “I’d like to report a missing person,” the woman said.

  Carrie moved around the police car, keeping an eye on the woman, assessing her demeanor and posture. “Who’s missing?” she said.

  “My daughter. She went out last night and never came home.”


  “How old is she?”

  “Twenty-two.”

  Carrie stopped walking and pulled a small notepad out of her uniform shirt pocket. “Name?”

  “Denise Lawson. You probably know her.”

  Everybody assumed all cops knew the people who dealt regularly with any other cops. “Nope. What’s your name?” Carrie said, still writing.

  “Marianne Lawson.” The woman dug into her purse, filing through papers stuffed inside. “I brought a recent photograph of her, and wrote down her height and weight and all the other information you might need. Can you track her on Facebook? I heard you can track a person that way.”

  Carrie stood there, looking at the woman, not writing. “Is your daughter suicidal?”

  “No,” Marianne said.

  “Is she suffering any other mental disorders?”

  “No,” Marianne said, seemingly confused by the question. She went back to her purse. “I have the photo right here. Just give me a moment.”

  “Ma’am,” Carrie said.

  “Here it is,” the woman said, pulling a picture out of her purse.

  Carrie looked at the photograph, seeing the pretty, young dark-haired woman smiling back at her. She wasn’t impressed. At twenty-two, Carrie had already been out of her father’s house for years, worked two jobs, put herself through the police academy, and gotten hired as a full-time police officer. It was hard for her to pity some little miss thing who lived with her parents and couldn’t be bothered to come home at night. “Ma’am.”

  “Yes?”

  “I can’t put your daughter in as a missing person.”

  “Sorry?”

  “I can’t put her in as a missing person. It’s not against the law for an adult to not come home if they don’t want to, and they have the right to not be bothered by the police about it. Best I can do is take a report that she hasn’t shown up, but I’m sure she’s fine. Just hang in there.”

  “No,” Marianne said. “No, you don’t understand. She would never not call. Not after everything we’ve been through.”